I wear lenses, never really troubles me cept when i first wake up, i've been on the drugs since september now and its going well, can't wait to finish the course though, they are a lot of hassel with regard to the dryness. The depression hasn't troubled me either, though i do notice i can feel moody at times or more sensitive then usual, nothing major though.

I have now been taking Roaccutane now for 45 days, and my skin is dry and seems to be alot better than its been for a while ( still not perfect though )...
The first 2 weeks where very rough indeed, my acne broke out worse than it has ever been - to the point where I was almost in tears with the pain ( Thank god for Ibuprofen )...
I had to see my Dermotologist to see if this was normal. She said it was unusual but not unexpected, and she prescribed some oral Antibiotics ( Erythromycin & Eumovate ointment for Eczema on my wrists which had also flared up ) to be taken with the Roaccutane for 2 weeks... Basically I was a mess and had a long beard after a few weeks and also rattled when I ran with all the tablets ...
After a week of the antibiotics and ointment, my face had settled down and also my Eczema on my wrists and back of my hands had settled down...
After a month I had to go back to my Dermotoligist for a review...
She has now doubled my dose to 100mg and - boy! am I starting to dry out - my face is dry, my back is itchy and dry and my lips are cracking and flaky ( using Doublebase cream and Vaseline lip balm helps )... Also my nose ( inside ) is dry. I have to keep blowing it every few hours because it gets blocked with the dryness, I will probably get some nose bleeds soon as other people have mentioned...
But I can notice the improvement in my skin already, its not as greasy and spotty as it usually is. People have also mentioned how my face seems to be improving, which is encouraging.
As for my mood, it hasn't been affected as of yet! I'm still a grump... ;grin;

I was wondering if anyone here has ever taken accutane (isotretinoin), and if so, what side effects did you experience from it? Did you experience any bowel bleeding or discomfort? I have an inflamatory bowel disease and am concearned that going on the medicine could make it worse. I am going to speak to my doctor about it but in the mean time would like to hear other peoples experiences of it if any?

k here goes. The doctors a while back tried to prescribe me roaccutane...but I got freaked out by the blood tests (extremely needle phobic) and all the side effects.

A few years later Im considering going back to the dermatologist (skin hasnt changed), who will probably again suggest roaccutane. However since then I have developed quite severe depression, and have come close to suicide 3 times....would it be wise to avoid the roaccutane, since it is linked with depression?

Just arrange to see the dermatologist and tell him/her that you've had trouble with depression. They'll tell you the risks I'm sure, or just refuse to give it to you, I don't know what their procedure is regarding existing depression. You might as well just talk to him/her!

Omg my best friend (who shall remain nameless) was exactly the same...
he was prescribed it for a skin problem and it made him so depressed...
i love him so much it was terrible to see.
he was taken off it a while ago and he got all happy again but then they put him back on it and again back came the depression...
i would go back to the docs and ask if there are any meds that dont have this side effect...
sorry if this post was useless

Basically there is a potential of exacerbating depression whilst on Roaccutane, but there is a very small chance of this side-effect affecting you; I took a course in 2003/4 and never experienced this.

Yes, there is the nasty part of the blood tests, but they are worth it I think. If you are a female, European Legislation has also just changed so you will have to have a pregnancy test before you are put on it, and also every month during your treatment (I think this is due to other side-effects affecting pregnancy/foetal development).

Again if you're female, the pill is also an option (as others have said) but you may not want to go down this route if you are not sexually active/are happy with your menstrual cycle.

Sadly, I am one of the people for whom one course of Roaccutane did not work, and although it did improve my skin massively, I still do have some spots as well as some brown scarring (how my particular skin type heals) so I have now been prescribed some topical treatments (I did not want the pill and said I would prefer to try other topical/oral solutions first before another course of Roaccutane), so I am now on Zineryt (applied in the morning) and another cream for nighttime.

Just telling you this so that you know there is a weird range of options for treating spots! Best of luck

from personal experience apart from getting pissed off that i couldn't drink alcohol, i found that roaccutane was fine for me and i was pretty depressed before taking it nothing serious though,

if you are female you do have to have a pregnancy test every month and the blood tests are awful, it also makes your skin dry and very fragile which was bad for me as i'm pretty accident prone and ended up with loads of cuts and grazes etc

it's been two years since my course finished and i have near perfect skin and i have become one of those irritating people who moans when they get a single spot

good luck on whatever you decide and it would probably help to speak to your GP or dermatologist more before you go ahead

I'd just go and see your dermatologist, only they can really assess this one. HOWEVER, don't downplay or lie about the depression, tell them. I was on Accutane a few years back now and suffered some depression side effects, didn't mention them, and it got really quite bad. So just make sure you mention it and between you and your derm you should be able to make an informed descision about it.

hey i just started this drug....but this talk of depression is silly....the official statistics are that 1/10,000 get depression whilst on roaccutane....and it isn't even proven that roaccutane is the root cause....and what makes this talk even more daft is that tonnes more than 1/10,000 get depression normally!!!
1/10,000 is actually welllllll below the national average for depression....its just put on the leaflet as a disclaimer.....

alrite op, i didn't want to go on roaccutane because of the depression links - my mums friend's son commmitted suicide on it.

I went to see Dr Chu in the Hammersmith hospital up in London, he's really good. I had really bad acne on my face and even worse on my back. He prescribed me one anitbiotic that I was on for a week (that my GP thought was for urinary tract infections) I think it was called trimethropin. But not 100%. This completely got rid of the horrible deep pussy spots (sorry for graphic description) and I haven't had any like that since.

He also put me on a six week course of Dapsone (a treatment for leprosy!!!) which my my spots appear far far less red. And then I put on Retin-A gel every other day which stops the oily skin (it does the same as stopping the oil as Roaccutane does but without the massive side effects - you do get red skin and a bit flaky but nowhere near as bad as my friends on roaccutane)

I also have every 2 months a laser treatment, which kills the bacteria in the skin and helps get rid of the scars.

It's not that much of an effort as it sounds, but I suppose if you live close to London then I'd recommend seeing him - if you search him on the internet you'll see he's one of the best. Most derms just say "go on roaccutane" but he gave me a different option which imo has worked just as well as roaccutane but without any of the nasty side effects.

(Original post by Micky13)
hey i just started this drug....but this talk of depression is silly....the official statistics are that 1/10,000 get depression whilst on roaccutane....and it isn't even proven that roaccutane is the root cause....and what makes this talk even more daft is that tonnes more than 1/10,000 get depression normally!!!
1/10,000 is actually welllllll below the national average for depression....its just put on the leaflet as a disclaimer.....

Yes, but I think it might be a bit different for people who have had depression (which is the case with the op (before thread was merged)), or a history of depression in the family.